Leggy Bugs--Walking Sticks

Walking sticks are a different kind of leggy bug from others I've previously written about. These bugs look like twigs with daddy-longleggy legs and longish antennae. (Visit "Leggy Bugs--Daddy Longlegs" to read about the three bug types known as daddy longlegs.) View a walking stick navigating plant life and leaves, mostly upside down, in "Walking Stick insect!". (Towards the end, a hand enters the view, providing perspective of the subject's size and structure.)

Elementary Information in the First-Person (Bug) POV

Visit Bugfacts.net's "Walking Stick" site for elementary information from a bug's first-person narrative. The ruler and side views illustrate body part proportions. The size range is impressive—"less than 1 inch to over 1 foot in length, depending on my species." An entertaining animation video "Walking Stick • I'm a Creepy Crawly" reiterates Bugfact's basic information about walking sticks.

Life Cycle, Life Span, Male/Female Contrasts

From Bugfact's "Walking Stick" site:

three stages of development: egg, nymph and adult. The female can lay up to 150 eggs, dropping them one by one to the ground. My egg is also camouflaged and resembles a brown seed. I hatch in the spring as a nymph and resemble a tiny adult. My life span is one season.

From "Giant Walkingstick - (Megaphasma denticrus)"

In some species of Walkingstick, males ride on the backs of the females for most of their adult lives. Some types of Walkingstick females can reproduce asexually, where males are difficult to find.

Watch a stick insect emerge from its egg at "Stick Insect Hatching". The bug's uncurling and exiting is amazing to behold. You might feel exhausted from empathy after watching the six-minute video.

Size Matters

The National WildLife Federation's "Walking Sticks" states:

The biggest insects in the world are stick insects—one species measures over 20 inches long with its legs outstretched.

ABC.net's article amuses for its account of an Australian walking stick—"Australia's largest stick insect, daughter of Lady Gaga-ntuan, lays eggs at Melbourne Museum", updated January 7, 2016.

One of Lady Gaga-ntuan's offspring has now grown to become the largest known stick insect in Australia, at 56.5cm [22.24"] long.

Xinhuanet, a Chinese publication, reports "World's longest insect discovered in China", published May 5, 2016.

Zhao Li, with the Insect Museum of West China (IMWC) in Chengdu, found the 62.4-cm-long [24 inches] stick insect during a field inspection in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in 2014, breaking the record for length for all 807,625 insects discovered so far, according to the IMWC.

View "New Insect Species Breaks Record for World’s Longest" for truly up-to-date info about the size record-holding insect found in China named for Zhao Li, the scientist who found it.

If you want to see even more images and videos about walking sticks (bugs, not canes), Google image and YouTube video searches for "walking stick bug" and "walking stick insect" yield plenty. Also, BugGuide shows pictures that people submit.

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Leggy Bugs articles:

• Centipedes and Millipedes
• Caterpillars (Lepidopteran Larvae, which Become Butterflies and Moths)
• Inchworms
• Crane Flies
• Daddy Longlegs
• Walking Sticks
• Praying Mantises
• Huntsman Spiders
• Grasshoppers